Product Description

Arranged for piano by Riccardo Scivales. Here is the first volume in a new Jazz Piano series from The Steinway Library of Piano Music! This masterful book answers the age-old question asked by nearly every jazz pianist: what more can I do with my left hand? Using hundreds upon hundreds of musical examples, jazz scholar and pianist Riccardo Scivales Piano takes you on a tour of the left hand styles and techniques of all the great pianists, from Jelly Roll Morton and Fats Waller to Chick Corea and Michel Camilo. And he shows you how to use their methods yourself!

An Encyclopedia of Left Hand Style You’ll no longer ponder how to get that swinging bass going, or how to fill in and add spark to the music with authentic left hand grooves. That great mystery of how to become a truly two fisted player will remain a mystery no longer, after you’ve gone through this treasure trove of left hand techniques used by the best jazz players who ever lived! This book is well over 250 pages long—a triumph of historical scholarship and practical, down-to-earth know-how!

Put Your Little Finger Here You’ll see exactly what these legendary jazz pianists did, and learn how they made their left hand moves sound so thrilling. You’ll become adept at every left hand style as Riccardo let’s you in on all the secrets… stride bass as adopted and improved by Jelly Roll, Earl Hines, Eubie Blake, Luckey Roberts, Donald Lambert, Cliff Jackson, Willie The Lion Smith, George Gershwin and Fats Waller… Spanish Tinged left hand stylings… blues and boogie devices… swing style figures made famous by Teddy Wilson, Art Tatum and Bob Zurke… techniques of Prebop, Bebop, and the new left hand… Erroll Garner’s strumming left hand figures… walking bass style… playing salsa stride patterns, montunos and bossa-novas… the basics of jazz ostinatos… rootless chord voicings… AND MORE!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #335872 in Books
• Published on: 2005-01
• Released on: 2005-08-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 164 pages

Customer Reviews

Most valuable piano instruction book I've ever used
What to do with the left hand has always been the most difficult part of piano playing to me... And it can be frustrating to try to hear what other pianists are doing off of records... because the piano has such a big layered sound... it's tough to hear what exactly pianists are doing...

This book goes over pretty much all the different left hand patterns used by jazz pianists... all the way from ragtime to present day... very thorough... James P Johnson, Fats Waller, Teddy Wilson and many,many more... (stride piano, walking tenths, broken tenths, walking basslines, broken octaves, etc... etc...)

For each pattern, the author mentions 1 or more songs that have used this pattern... plus gives the musical notation (both left and right hand) for the section of the song using the pattern... Sometimes I will buy the song mentioned off itunes, so that I can hear the pattern being played.

There's more than enough here for the aspiring pianist to develop a left-hand vocabulary... You can also perhaps make your own original left hand patterns (mixing and matching the different patterns in the book)... this is what I've been doing myself.

This is not just for jazz players... but for anyone interested in jazz, rock, pop or boogie woogie piano...

Great book. Not for beginners
This is not a step by step, "Left Hand Technique for Dummies" kind of book. The author seems to know a lot about the history of jazz and has compiled examples of the left hand technique of many piano masters. The first half the book is more historic and talks about stride piano and the early players. The rest is more from bebop era and forward. His charts are hard to read and definitely require piano experience. I found the latin chapters too short, but is it understandable in a broad subject like this. I also wish there was more meterial about Bill Evans.

Good book. It will take me a lot of time to go through this.

The Left Hand
There is a lot of good information in this book. Make sure your sight reading skills are up to par before buying this book.